Slashdot Mirror
Ubisoft's New DRM Cracked In One Day
Colonel Korn writes "Ubisoft's recent announcement that upcoming games would require a constant internet connection in order to play has been discussed at length on Slashdot ('The Awful Anti-Pirate System That Will Probably Work'). Many were of the opinion that this new, more demanding DRM would have effectiveness to match its inconvenience, at least financially justifying its use. Others assumed that it would be immediately cracked, as is usually the case, leaving the inconvenience for paying customers and resulting in a superior product for pirates. As usual, the latter group was right. Though Ubisoft won't yet admit it, Skid-Row managed to crack the new DRM less than a day after it was first released."
No they did not. They said such a patch could be made. It does not currently exists and the question they don't answer is. If Ubisoft lose all their money, and go bankrupt, who is going to pay the developer for making the code to remove the drm.
Unless someone can point me to a clause in the DMCA that allows the circumvention of public domain works, that is.
The DMCA would only apply to access control mechanisms that protect an underlying copyrighted work. There is case law on this; simply cracking an access control mechanism is not enough to run afoul of the DMCA, there has to be something copyrighted that is being protected by it (e.g. not just a short number for example). (However, cracking and access control mechanism to a copyrighted work without infringing the work will run afoul of the DMCA, so the law is still idiotic).
In this case if the work's copyright had expired, there would be no valid copyright in question, so the DMCA would not apply. But your point about the ban on distribution of tools in interesting... since in this hypothetical situation, a circumvention tool would probably contain material that could crack access controls on both copyrighted and copyright-expired works.
"Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson
Standard IANAL disclaimer. Just an interested amateur.
Copyright is life of the author + 70 OR 95 years from publication OR 120 years from creation (in the United States). Life+70 is only used in some cases (non-anonymous, non-pseudonymous, non-work-for-hire) -- most works are under the flat 95 years from publication (or 120 years from creation for anything not published). But other countries have different laws -- Canada is life+50 instead of life+70, for example.
What the GP was referring to, however, was how essentially nothing becomes public domain these days, due to *constant* lobbying by large corporations to extend and restrict copyright, patents, and trademarks (major extensions in the USA happening in 1976 and 1998 -- life+50/70 in 1976 and life+70/95 in 1998, both of these commonly believed to have been passed specifically as a result of Disney lobbying to 'protect' Mickey Mouse). That and the complexities of copyright law and revisions to those laws that make it nearly impossible to tell if a work is covered by copyright or not unless it was published prior to 1923 (which means it's definitely not).
Once past 1923 (but before 1976), it depends on if a work was ever registered and renewed or not -- and by god, there are massive disputes over many works from this period (were they registered, who renewed them, were they renewed, who had the rights to renew them at the time, etc...). If published, registered, and renewed, it's 95 years from publication for any works between 1923 and 1976. If not published (but registered and renewed -- I don't think many, if any, works fit this), it would be 120 years. Once you hit 1976, it depends on if the work is covered under the life+70 or the flat 95. If the work has a non-anonymous, non-psuedonoymous author, and was not a work-for-hire, then you have to find out the date of death for the original author and add 70 years. If the work was anonymous, pseudonymous, or a work-for-hire, then the flat 95 applies. Unless that work was unpublished, in which case it's 120 years instead (and don't ask me what the barrier for 'publication' is, I have no idea). I also have no idea which does/doesn't apply if there are multiple authors or anything else vaguely unusual about a work's authorship.
Anyway, this applies for works in the USA. International copyright probably gets even more nasty with the varied treaties/extradition/etc. Basic rule of thumb, currently, is that the USA has the longest copyright and anything before 1923 is therefore safe. Anything after that, you'd need to do a lot of research on who does/doesn't hold the rights. Or take a gamble that no one will care/notice -- but that's probably not smart.